Archive for the 'Uncategorized' Category

Two years ago I made some predictions of what’s coming in the next five years (just for fun). While going through older posts, I found my predictions and thought it’d fun to see if any has come true.

(2014) Ease of life

Technology will continue to make life easier. Very soon when we sit down in our car at 6pm, the car will know we are about to go home. It calculates the best route based on real time traffic conditions. If the traffic is bad, the car may suggest we do our grocery shopping before heading back. The car “talks” with our smart phones. Our phone keeps our shopping list and “tells” the car which store we need to go to. If our calendar shows we have a dinner appointment, our car knows immediately when we sit in front of the steering wheel and will route accordingly. Want to do something fun instead of being stuck in traffic? Our phone suggests a few interesting events going on in our proximity. The car will then pick up the route.

All these data exit today, in separate places. For our lives to be wrapped in a seamless information net, the data needs to be connected to create intelligence. Doing so will require two things.

The devices talk to each other. The Internet of things.

The data sync. It’s not necessarily big in volume, but can be diversified in types.

We still waste a lot of time every day by doing tasks separately. We used to go to specific stores to buy certain things. Grocery shopping in grocery stores, pharmacy in pharmacies, books in bookstores. Now most of the “operational” shopping (shopping needed to sustain our living) can be done online. I am very close to ordering toilet paper on Amazon. The rest of bathroom supplies are already from them. Brick and mortar stores will become even more specialized to provide the deep domain knowledge which can be consumed more pleasantly during face to face interactions. Think of wine, cheese, farmers’ market, clothing store that does styling…

(2016)We are not there yet. But I continue to believe the life “assisted” by AI will come soon.

(2014) Meet-ups

With the time saved, we have more time to play. Very soon people will get tired of mass reaching, surface scratching, sentence reading online social interactions and long for the real face to face one. Meet-up will continue to do well but will become smarter in creating and suggesting activities. People will feel ok to interact with strangers when the right atmosphere is created. You don’t have to be a super extrovert for that initial hi to happen.

(2016) Social media still rules. Even more formats and channels are created. But, I did join Eventbrite, an online marketplace for offline experience. True to my own prediction ;).

Transportation

Considering how much time we spend on getting from place to place, the traffic is an inevitable candidate for the next wave of innovation. The challenge can be solved by either building smarter mass transportation or enhancing the efficiency of individual transportation. A smarter mass transportation will be faster, cleaner and more predictable. It will address the other annoying parts of not driving as well such as waiting time. Stations need to be redesigned. They are the perfect venue for human interactions, for utilizing the small chucks of time (e.g. grocery shopping). I have seen some of such stations in Europe and China. I can only imagine US does even a better job. Efficiency in individual transportation relies on minimizing the human error and averaging out the different levels of driving competency. Self-driving cars seem to be an obvious answer. However, those who drive more inefficiently, not to stereotype, tend to be late adopters of newer technology. The whole system won’t improve significantly if only the already efficient becomes more so. There has to be huge incentives for less efficient drivers and cars to change. Just for the love of new technology won’t do. Maybe it’s a better designed car that is actually cheaper than what we own now. We do not have to pay the hefty price to be included in the technical advancement. After all, the whole society moves forward when even the bottom is lifted. Lifting the top is artificial.

(2016) I so wish this would have come true! For the past 15 months I have been commuting on Caltrain. I am also holding off buying a new car until the self-driving car hits mass market. Can’t wait to be driven by no one!

(2014) Health

The problem of the lack of health in some populations in the developed countries is not due to denied access to modern medical technology. People just don’t have interesting physical things to do. Not everyone cares whether they look fabulously thin. But everyone wants to do things that make them happy. Software is not going to solve that problem. Again it’s going to solve the problem for people already have the incentive and just need an organizer app. The real challenge is how to persuade an overweight single mom to exercise. Conditions for that to happen may not include downloading an app (and the prerequisite of owning a smartphone). She has to have the time. Her baby needs to be taken care of while she exercises. She needs places to do so. She needs a better diet. She needs a support network to provide mental reward. Addressing these issues of a less financially capable group may not make an entrepreneur rich fast. And it is not a challenge assigned only to social entrepreneurs.

(2016) I still find gym boring. Running is great. But the gym is boring ;).

The abundance of things

At some point the financial market will realize the ever-increasing appetite for growth rate is a fiction. Companies’ growth leads to the increasing supply of goods and services. The only way for the supply to become profit is through consumption. Everyone, in developed countries, emerging markets and poor nations, needs to buy more. This also means we need to get rid of what we already own and make room for the newer and shinier. We recycle, export to less developed countries (old Chinese cars in Lima), or hand down (Goodwill). Getting rid of things will become a business of its own. If the things we build today are meant to be replaced in just a few years, our rooms will fill up quickly. Eventually the total society cost of taking the old away, apart and making them disappear could even be more costly than producing new.

(2016) That’s some deep thinking!

(2014) Still exciting

This feels, once again, the verge of some fundamental changes. Web is the last wave I’ve observed. Elements for the next one are in the making. They are moving toward each other. There will be brilliant thinkers to connect the dots in ways previously unthought-of. There will be fortune-changing money moving into the direction. So many times, knowledge is not about creating new notions; it is about reinterpreting what’s already there and connecting the existing dots. So are innovations.

I am old fashioned in the way that I read printed book; and carry a notebook with me. When ideas came to me sitting in a restaurant, on the train, or on a ship going around Galapagos islands, I wrote them down. This is one of the entries.

A real weapon detector

A California teenage were shot dead by police who mistook his replica gun for real assault weapon. Firstly, we can’t ask every policeman to stay calm and carefully assess the situation as such when their own lives may be on the line. Secondly, we can’t stop teenage doing silly things which sometimes may even cost their lives. Yet, in this technologically advanced era, why can’t a real weapon be easily differentiated from a fake one? Can all guns be manufactured with a chip built in which sends out signal to a receiver installed on all police forces’ weapons. A loud beep and flash lights indicate a real weapon is in presence. Of course there will be malfunctions and false detections. No technology is perfect, but it’s better than guessing. The signal emission challenge a gun manufacturer will face is no different from any “internet of things” manufacturers – source of power, battery life, retro fitting, proximity…I would imagine this is as real problem to solve as making our house anticipating our needs.

Does it take a professional designer to create a comfortable living space and intuitive products? I asked this question while vacationing in Shanghai.

Many of the products I used every day are generic and bear no designer’s name. The products are often made following the template drawn from previous generations’ trial and error. For example, in a modern bathroom the light switch is placed either outside the room or on the wall besides the bathroom door, often to the right. Any other placements may cause confusion. A paper thin ceramic cup has round rim to avoid the paper-cut sensation on the lip. Such details, if missed, do not reduce the products’ functionality, but does not make the product enjoyable to use.

Pursuing only the perfect appearance, or the speed of production, manufacturers can forget the user’s experiences of the products is an integral part of a successful product. In a society where waiting for a taxi for more than a minute is considered unacceptable by many, few slows down to notice the cup’s rim is too thin. Even when they do recognize the design defect, they choose to go for mass production rather than rework. The market is full of such products, though not meant to be one-time use, often ended up so because their lack of long-term appeal. Have you seen the tea packed in elaborate boxes? Popular gifts in China. The package can cost many times more than the product it contains. Walking down the super market, the aisle of plastic products smells toxic. A lot of consumers don’t expect their cheap cell phones last more than a couple of years. The waste from products created hastily is appalling.

Why such a rush? Maybe Chinese are very competitive under our mild manner and philosophy. We are eager to catch up with the more developed world in the shortest possible time and at all cost. The bullet train system, one of the world’s most advanced, was built in merely a few years; and runs on mountains of corruption. During the top railroad official’s corruption trail, argument was made for a more lenient punishment since he made the bullet train “possible”. The same logical thinking dominates many development decisions balancing between short-term economical results and potential long-term environmental impact.

I was about to skip dinner (the full English breakfast lasted for a whole day!) when I discovered two highly rated Asian restaurants were within 5 minutes’ walk from my hotel. One of them is Chinese. The other Japanese. As my trip back to Shanghai is only a few weeks away, Japanese became an obvious choice.

And Roka did not disappoint. The restaurant was full on a Wednesday night. The center of the restaurant was the open kitchen. Sitting at the counter facing the kitchen, I could feel the excitement seeing fire jumping up on the grill and hearing the energetic chefs (5 of them, plus one coordinating the orders) acknowledging each order called out to them.

I ordered four small dishes to test – otoro for the fish quality, jumbo sweet shrimp sashimi with caviar for a treat, spinach with sesame dressing for the tradition, and home made tofu with water melon (a new item on the menu) for innovation.

Otoro came out as some of the best I had ever had, so was the ebi. Spinach was a totally surprise. Instead of boiled, the raw spinach leaves were stacked up in the center of the plate, surrounded by strings of carrot and shreds of daikon, spread on was the sesame dressing and the real sesame seeds. The cold tofu was soft in a broth with mixture of watermelon juice and sesame oil, served together with cherry tomatoes, green onions, water melon pieces, and surprisingly, thin slices of hot pepper. The whole meal’s taste was clean, yet interesting in a subtle way. One had to pay attention to taste the intricate flavors.

To complete the experience, the counter was made from raw wood, polished but with original wood pattern showing. And the ceramics were master pieces.

People here seem to take breakfast seriously. Instead of grabbing and going, it is more a sitting down, drinking a cup of tea, reading newspaper, and having a chat type.

Turkish tea is definitely a popular breakfast drink, while in my observation coffee is more enjoyed in the afternoon. There is also a local yogurt drink with a slight taste of saltiness.

Pastry choices for breakfast are plenty. The local bagel topped with sesame seeds, also sold as snack through the day, is toasted with cheese. Baklava stuffed with minced meat or spinach is also common. The unusual breakfast, for a foreign, is what they called the breakfast plate – cucumber, tomato, olives, and cheese. My local colleague told me he could hardly imagine a breakfast without olive or cheese.

My breakfast at the hostel in the Sultanahmet district was nothing fancy, but largely enhanced by the view from the breakfast room :).

On the second day of our arrival in Istanbul, my college and I were recommended to dine in a well known Turkish restaurant Devali. The restaurant offered a set menu, serving many dishes of traditional Turkish food. It is located on the water front in the Kalamis marina. We arrived about ten minutes before eight, and the restaurant was half full. We were lucky to get a table on the outside deck, looking over docked sailing boats and a beautiful sunset. When we sat down, the appetizers were already placed on the table – bread, olives, tomato paste, dates, salads. All delicious looking. We immediately started eating, and quickly realized no other customers were touching the food on their tables. Everyone was just chatting. The situation was even more awkward as we were the only two Asians there! Puzzled, we looked around but couldn’t stop munching on the delicious food.

Then, a few minutes past eight, the sun sunk below the horizon. As if a silent order was given, everyone started eating. The restaurant suddenly fell silent. Dishes were brought out one after another. Almost twenty minutes later, people looked up from their food, lit a cigarette, sat back in their chairs, and started chatting again. Dishes kept on arriving at our table. The full meal lasted almost three hours, completed with Turkish coffee or tea.

We related our experiences to our Turkish colleagues the next day. And only then realized we arrived during the last week of Ramadan. I sure hope we did not offend anyone in the restaurant!